5FILMS

I CAN’T WAIT
TO SEE

By the time you read this, I’ll have seen two dozen films in prepa­ra­tion for TIFF. If I’m re­ally, re­ally lucky, I might even have caught one of my five most highly an­tic­i­pated ti­tles from the list be­low. Though I’d set­tle for an early look at Paul Thomas An­der­son’s The Master, Bal­tasar Kor­mákur’s The Deep, Ben Wheat­ley’s Sight­seers, Sion Sono’s The Land Of Hope or Peaches’s Peaches Does Her­self.

I’m pretty open is what I’m say­ing.

Argo

Ben Af­fleck’s third di­rec­to­rial ef­fort – after Gone Baby Gone and The Town – dra­ma­tizes the 1979 ef­forts of the CIA to re­trieve six Americans from the Cana­dian em­bassy in Tehran by send­ing in an agent ( Af­fleck) pos­ing as the pro­ducer of a quickie sci-fi movie. (He’s sup­posed to be in Iran to scout lo­ca­tions.) It’s Wag The Dog with a hair trig­ger, co-star­ring Alan Arkin, John Good­man, Bryan Cranston, Vic­tor Gar­ber, Kyle Chandler and Chris Messina. Septem­ber 7, 6:30 pm, Roy Thom­son Hall; Septem­ber 8, 11 am, and Septem­ber 15, 3 pm, El­gin

Every­day

Michael Win­ter­bot­tom and his ac­tors, John Simm and Shirley Hen­der­son, shot this drama – about a cou­ple whose re­la­tion­ship is tested when he’s im­pris­oned on drug charges – piece­meal over the course of five years, the bet­ter to let the ac­tors age in real time and de­velop their char­ac­ters sep­a­rately. I can’t wait to see what they’ve come up with. Septem­ber 8, 6: 45 pm, TIFF Bell Light­box 1; Septem­ber 10, 3 pm, Cine­plex Yonge & Dundas 7; Septem­ber 16, 12:30 pm, TIFF Bell Light­box 2

Joss Whe­don was mak­ing The Avengers but he got bored dur­ing post-pro­duc­tion. So he called a bunch of friends and shot a fea­ture-length adap­ta­tion of Wil­liam Shake­speare’s com­edy. You know, just for a lark. Amy Acker and Alexis Denisof, who played out what may be Whe­don’s great­est ro­mance on An­gel, re­unite as Beatrice and Benedick, and Nathan Fil­lion plays Dogberry, which may be even bet­ter screen cast­ing than Michael Keaton in Ken­neth Branagh’s 1993 ver­sion. Septem­ber 8, 2:30 pm, El­gin; Septem­ber 9, 12:30 pm, Is­abel Bader; Septem­ber 14, 11 am, El­gin

To The Won­der

After last year’s tri­umphant, tran­scen­dent The Tree Of Life, Ter­rence Mal­ick re­turns (in record time!) with a new drama star­ring Ben Af­fleck, Rachel McA­dams, Olya Kurylenko and Javier Bar­dem. I don’t know any­thing about it other than the run­ning time (112 min­utes!), and given Mal­ick’s ten­dency to­ward se­crecy, I’m not sure we can even take that as gospel. Septem­ber 10, 7 pm, and Septem­ber 11, 3 pm, Princess of Wales; Septem­ber 16, 9: 45 pm, TIFF Bell Light­box 1